Wednesday, December 14, 2011

One of the most egregious narratives Barack Obama has been putting forward is that he has to do things on his own because he would otherwise have to deal with a 'do-nothing' Congress. It's fallacious because it's a 'do-nothing' Senate that is to blame for legislation not reaching his desk. Here's another example. The House has passed a bill that would extend the payroll tax cuts while tying it to the mandated construction of the Keystone pipeline from Canada to Texas.

Passage, on a largely party-line vote of 234-193, sent the measure toward its certain demise in the Democratic-controlled Senate, triggering the final partisan showdown of a remarkably quarrelsome year of divided government.

The legislation "extends the payroll tax relief, extends and reforms unemployment insurance and protects Social Security — without job-killing tax hikes," Republican House Speaker John Boehner declared after the measure had cleared.

Referring to the controversy over the Keystone XL pipeline, he added, "Our bill includes sensible, bipartisan measures to help the private sector create jobs."

On a long day of finger pointing, however, House Democrats accused Republicans of protecting "millionaires and billionaires, " and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., derided the GOP-backed pipeline provision as "ideological candy" for the tea party-set.

Not only does this provide another example that the House continues to pass legislation the Senate lets die but this bill was bi-partisan in both its support and opposition.

Voting in favor of the legislation were 224 Republicans and 10 Democrats, while 179 Democrats and 14 Republicans opposed it.

At its core, the measure did include key parts of the jobs program that Obama asked Congress to approve in September.

This bill will do two things Obama says he wants to do. First, it will create jobs. Second, it will keep taxes from rising on the middle class. Despite this, Obama has pledged to veto the bill and the Eco-whacko vote has a lot to do with it.

Interestingly, the number of jobs that will be created as a direct result of the pipeline will be over 100,000 according to Rep. Dave Camp (R-MI). The State Department says it will only total 6,000. That last figure is laughable but even if we assume it's accurate, the economy is in a state where beggars can't be choosers. The figure is on the positive side of zero.